Thanksgiving
Larry the FedEx Man asked me yesterday “Do we get a blog tomorrow?” Of course, Larry. That’s one of the things you’re thankful for. Of course, there are a few others. Like, for instance:
Mothers
Where have all the mothers gone, long time passing? Remember when you were a little kid and you were bad and your mother pretended she was leaving? I do. Of course, she would always stay, or come back, at least. And then she would tell you, “You’re going to miss me when I’m gone.” And since your mother was so very young you would never worry a whole lot about that. Guess what? For most of you, your mother’s gone. And you miss her, just like she said you would. For the rest of you, well, you get the point.
There is nothing like a mother. Mothers might get mad at you, but they show up in crisis, come hell or high water. You could be the Zodiac Killer or Gary The Grinder, who gutted a family of six and ran them through the meat processor, shipping the remains to the starving children of St. Genevieve’s Orphanage in Bangladesh, and your mother would show up for your execution in tears, shrieking “They’re murdering my baby!” They can’t help it. That’s how mothers are. It comes with the mother gene.
My sister, Alice (the Republican), was mean to our mother. After our father died, Alice decided there was nobody around to enforce regulations so she could do whatever she wanted and she did. Her mother told her she hoped that some day Alice’s kids would treat her the same way. Alice said that curse took hold. My other sister, Kathy, never did one mean thing to anybody, let alone her mother, whom she presided over until death. Me? Well, there was that time with the May Procession capes, but I didn’t do it on purpose. I mean, I was only in the First Grade, f’Chrissakes, how was I supposed to know?
What happened was the nun teaching the first grade, Sister Joseph Ambrose, asked if there were any children out there with mothers who might be willing to sew some fur onto the borders of the May Procession capes for our class, about 35 kids. I naively raised my hand. What the hell—my mother could sew with the best of them. Not to mention my grandmother. Anyway, to my great delight, I won the grand prize—my mother was selected to do the job. I eagerly raced home to give her the good news.
“WHAT???” she screamed, flabbergasted, jumping up from her chair. “Thirty five capes? What made you think I had time to do that?”
Gee, Ma, I dunnow.
In case you were wondering, and I certainly would be, a May Procession is a parade—or, more likely, was a parade some Catholic parishes held the first Sunday in May, celebrating Jesus’ Mother, Mary. All the girls would wear white dresses and the boys white shirts and short pants (relatives with good photos could blackmail the boys for years with these) and parade down the street from the school to the church, where they would then engage in further hijinks. Oh yeah, and the boys got to wear capes.
“But Ma—I don’t want to be in the May Procession!”
“Did you know you get to wear a CAPE?”
“Oh. Really? What kind of cape?”
“A white satin one with red fringe on the border.”
“Well, okay then.”
Anyway, my mother made the 35 capes and they were perfect, of course. My mother never did anything half-assed, especially if other mothers were going to see it. Sister Joseph Ambrose was delighted and she told the whole class what a wonderful job William Killeen’s mother did. Aw shucks, twarn’t nuthin, I told them. Yeah, for me twarn’t nuthin. Don’t even ask my mother.
Home Towns
We’ve had this home town discussion before. I’ve decided I have three of them: Fairfield now, Gainesville previously and Lawrence, Mass. originally. I would like to make a firm pronouncement that Ocala is not now, never has been and never shall be my home town. Despite the fact that gym pals Sharon and John and Barbara and Bruce live there, despite Harry the mechanic taking wonderful care of my car, despite the pretty horse farms and the wonderful Dunkin Donuts stores and the nice horse trainers, Ocala can’t possibly be my home town. Why, it’s filled to the brim with horrible right-wing reactionaries, drooling religious fanatics and Others Uncouth whose idea of a high art form is the Orange Blossom Opry in Weirsdale. (Okay, I like it, too.)
I grew up in Lawrence, an old textile town full of gigantic red-brick mills. If you ever decide to go there to visit the home of an important writer like myself, you’d do well to bring mace. The town has fallen into disrepair, taken over by sullen gangs of drug-dealers from third world countries who will steal the wheels off your car if you leave it for three minutes. But we loved it when we were growing up.
For one thing, Lawrence had great neighborhoods. Almost every house had two or three stories and a ton of kids in each (we’re all Catholics, remember). There was a ballfield down at the end of the street, suitable for all occasions. The B&M Railroad, which owned it, didn’t even care if we painted giant numbers on the wall of their supply building denoting how many feet it was from there to home plate.
In the evenings, after dinner and before dark, tons of kids filled the streets playing tag (not “touch”) football or ring-a-levio or basketball with a crooked rim and no net. Many of the girls were roughnecks (Joycie Lavery was better than her brother, Jimmy, at football) and participated fully. Nobody got bullied very much. The worst insult was to constantly get picked last when sides were chosen up and, hey, if your feelings got hurt, learn to hit better.
On Thanksgiving, in alternate years, the annual Lawrence-Lowell football game was held at the Memorial Stadium just down the road. Everyone went even though Lawrence always lost. The place was packed with up to ten thousand people and you could tell it was a big deal because the city spread very nice straw around the benches for that game only. The game was held at ten in the morning and when it was over everybody retreated home for Thanksgiving dinner, which we were somehow able to eat at one p.m.
On Sundays, everybody went to church at St. Patrick’s. Everybody but that Protestant, Jackie Fournier, who rarely went to church at all and was the subject of envy to many because of it. Masses at St. Patrick’s were held almost every hour of the morning but we kids had our own special Mass at 8:30, during which the sainted Monsignor Daley or one of his verbose henchmen delighted in telling us we would all be going to hell unless we abstained from even thinking about kissing members of the opposite sex, let alone actually doing it. Gee—how could you stop from thinking about it? Stay busy. “Idle hands are the Devil’s workshop.”
It seems bothersome now, but in the winter, the snow would overwhelm the landscape, to the delight of all. Well, all the kids anyway. First of all, if it was considerable enough, there would be no school. We sat anxiously by our radios waiting for the No School bulletins. There was always no school announced right away in mysterious and obscure places like Rowley, for instance, which nobody ever heard of except in the No School bulletins, but we had to wait long and hard for the “No School In Lawrence” news, which didn’t come often.
While the adults were mildly put off with snow, the kids loved it, promptly building forts and pummeling everyone in sight with snowballs. It could be 8 degrees out there and we never realized we were cold until we got inside and had to thaw out our frozen fingers. The trip to the house was fraught with peril, of course, as large, menacing icicles formed at the edges of the rooftops, threatening to pierce your tiny body as you made your way down the walk to the door. I can still remember my grandmother getting after them with her broom, to varying degrees of success. Every so often, we would hear of some poor unfortunate killed by a hundred-pound icicle but it was never anybody we knew so we kept walking under them, tho casting a wary eye upward.
From the first time I moved to a college town—Stillwater, Oklahoma—I have been unhappy living elsewhere. It’s okay to live a few miles away, but not too far. I like the spirit of college towns, the activity, the intelligence. Gainesville, where I lived for 25 years, is a great college town. Not too big, not too small. Easy enough to get around in. Not the cheapest place in the world to live, but not too expensive unless you are buying gas there, in which case it is the most expensive place in the world. Noone seems to know why this is, but we can live with it.
Gainesville is full of trees. In late February, the dogwoods and azaleas spring forth in great proliferation, presaging the Vernal Equinox. The city is two hours from the airports of Jacksonville, Orlando and Tampa, so you can get places quickly. St. Augustine and the Atlantic Ocean are an hour and a half away to the east, and Cedar Key and the Gulf of Mexico less than that to the west.
Gainesville, supportive of the Charlatan Magazine and the Subterranean Circus, allowed me to thrive from the early age of 27. I’m thankful for the live-and-let-live atmosphere promoted by its citizenry that still prevails today. I continue to live a mere 25 miles away and visit often. There are at least six restaurants in Gainesville better than the best one in Ocala, the art and music scenes are incomparably superior and the people who go to the movies there are much less likely to annoy you with idle chatter and beaming cell phones.
If you want to raise horses, however, it’s better to be in Marion County. The limerock outcroppings beneath the surface inject calcium into the soil and put better bone into horses raised in Marion County. The land is less expensive, the stallion stations are there, as are the feed stores, the training facilities, the sales companies, etc. Fairfield is a tiny little place equidistant from Gainesville and Ocala, about five miles west of Interstate 75. The most famous and celebrated edifice is the Post Office, ruled by the steady hand of Julie Dare, who will commiserate with her customers over the latest problems of the Gators and rejoice with them in victory.
Despite the meager population, Fairfield is home to at least two Protestant churches and a very quiet Greek Orthodox training facility which nobody, even Julie, knows much about. The only other business of distinction is the V-Mart, part of the same building as the Post Office, a minute-mart-without-gas operated by an incense-burning fellow of the Arabic persuasion. Natives were a little wary at first, but time heals most suspicions just as it does wounds.
Nobody steals anything in Fairfield. You can leave your door unlocked (we don’t) or your gate open (we don’t) or the keys in your ignition (Siobhan does, for all you truck thieves out there) and never have to worry. The neighbors are nice and mind their own business. If your horses run into the street, they will help you catch them. If your dog lies in the middle of the road, they will go to great pains to avoid damaging him.
The worst thing that ever happened here was that ten years ago an old lady at the end of the street sold her declining property to drug dealers. To illustrate that this operation was not overly enormous, let me advise that these fellows also sold illegal cigarettes. This was okay until the enterprise began drawing in people who were short on funds and began visiting the neighbors, including us, bumming drug money. Siobhan badgered the Sheriff’s Office into intervening and they did. One day, we arrived home to squad cars, circling helicopters, the whole nine yards. They arrested everybody in sight. The culprits bonded out and resumed their business. Two weeks later, the Sheriff came back and arrested them again. That was the end of Fairfield’s Great Drug Episode. It’s been quiet ever since.
So I’m thankful for Mothers and Hometowns, first and foremost, but there are other things we must leave for another time. Girlfriends. Old Pals. Horses. Even Doctors, unless you are Stuart Bentler. For now, we’re thankful for blog readers, and, of course, for dinners and those who prepare them. Thanksgiving dinner forever remains a link to the past and brings forth memories of beloved friends and family who have shared this day with us in earlier times. It is a little sad sometimes to remember them because then it is that we most feel their loss. But that is the way it’s supposed to be. That is what provides us greater cognizance of the here-and-now, an appreciation for what we have around us this day. Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.
Watch that second helping…..
